


that voodoo that you do so well

by veterization



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: Episode: s02e10 The Bizarre Voodoo World Of New Orleans, Jealousy, M/M, Or Is It?, Voodoo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-08
Updated: 2021-02-08
Packaged: 2021-03-13 06:21:19
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 17,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29273883
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/veterization/pseuds/veterization
Summary: Ryan buys a voodoo potion oil at Voodoo Authentica meant to attract Yummy Boys. Appropriately, things happen.
Relationships: Ryan Bergara/Shane Madej
Comments: 28
Kudos: 111





	that voodoo that you do so well

**Author's Note:**

  * For [personalspacecraft](https://archiveofourown.org/users/personalspacecraft/gifts).



> This is a belated birthday gift/Valentine's Day present to my loudest and sweetest cheerleader, Hannah, who is the sort of incredible friend who will happily follow you from fandom to fandom without complaints. I asked her what BFU episode she'd like a story based off of and she picked the Voodoo World of New Orleans, which was GREAT and WEIRD in equal measures because I decided to use an actual conversation I had in Voodoo Authentica a few years ago re: voodoo potion oils as the basis for this story.
> 
> Title comes from the song You Do Something To Me, which everybody and their brother has covered, but my personal favorites are Frank Sinatra's and Conal Fowkes' versions.

Shane’s been acting weird ever since they got to New Orleans.

“Weird in what way, Ryan?” Shane says, edging on defensive, when Ryan mentions it and asks if he’s okay.

“I don’t know. Different from your usual weirdness.”

“My usual weirdness?”

“You know, your whole personality.”

Ryan makes an all-encompassing gesture to make it clear that every visible part of Shane is weird, and the invisible parts too. Shane’s response is to laugh, which does distract Ryan from his concern. He’s been a bit quiet, a bit less receptive to Ryan’s jokes, but maybe it’s just a funk he’s snapping out of. Ryan won’t push if he can avoid pushing.

This is a fun trip, after all. The Dauphine Orleans hotel was awfully swanky compared to the sleeping bag on a parquet floor they're used to (spooky footsteps notwithstanding), and yesterday they ate gumbo and jambalaya in their downtime, and today they’re gearing up for the voodoo investigation. After everything he’s read up on the subject, Ryan’s been looking forward to shooting this episode for a while. This is spooky and fascinating in a whole new way compared to the usual suspects of ghosts and specters, and Ryan’s nothing if not a junkie for the spooky and fascinating.

“Do I have powdered sugar on my face?” Ryan asks, putting down his beignet and looking down at his white lap. He tries to brush the sugar off with minimal success.

Shane looks at him and grins for one flicker of a moment. “No,” he says.

“Right. Okay. So it’s everywhere, then?”

“Don’t worry about it, Ryan. It’s a distinguished look.”

Ryan will deal with the streaks on his pants later. For now he just wipes his hands down his cheeks and chin until the powdered sugar is gone and he looks like an adult again.

Then he reaches for another beignet, because he's unable to help himself.

“You know what I just realized?” Shane says, pointing at the sugar beard Ryan’s sporting after two bites. “You’d make a great mall Santa. You’ve just got that look. Time to embrace it, man.”

“You’re an idiot.”

Ryan stuffs the last bit into his mouth, savoring the heaps of sugar and the soft warmth of the fried dough. There’s so much to do today, and sweet treats are only the start of it. They have cemeteries and voodoo shops to visit, and that’s just the afternoon. This evening they meet up with Bloody Mary, which Ryan is simultaneously excited about and wary of. Two emotions that always, without fail, seem to blend on these supernatural shoots.

He checks the time on his phone. They were given strict instructions for when to be back at the hotel, and if they don’t want an earful on _managing time_ and _planning ahead_ , they need to leave soon.

Just one more beignet first.

Shane lifts the plate, eyes inviting. “Want another?”

“You read my mind,” Ryan says.

\--

Voodoo Authentica is a bit of an overwhelming experience. Everywhere Ryan looks, there’s more to see, smell, touch, and it makes the shop feel like it’s full of so much character that it’s essentially its own living, breathing being.

They film a conversation with the practitioner, Zaar, who talks to them about altars and the intentions behind voodoo and welcomes them to look around. Ryan doesn’t even know where to begin, so he just starts where is, determined to take in the whole experience while Shane wanders off, intrigued by something at the far end of the shop.

There’s just _so much_ , definitely more than Ryan expected. He naively considered voodoo to be a voodoo doll and maybe a tiny cauldron, but now he feels like he’s huddled inside a whole new world, seeing not just the branches above but also the roots below and just how deeply they’re spread. It’s what he likes most about these shoots, how the universe expands a little more each time Ryan learns something new and uncovers another part of it.

This shop is its own little universe in and of itself. The aged wood of the shelves, the colorful masks on the walls, the tables crowded with artifacts and products alike, all of it seems to come alive and look Ryan in the eye. On his left are gris-gris bags and herb collections. On his right are figurines and spiritual dolls. Diagonally, there’s even _more_.

The wall of potion oils gives him pause. Maybe it’s because something about the word _potion_ just carries almost mystical qualities, something that only really exists in books about warlocks and witches. The vials are small, too, with tiny herbs floating through the oils. Ryan picks one up— _Get That Job_ , this one says—and shakes it until flecks of leaves are galvanized into lazy movement.

“Do these really work?” he asks Zaar. “The, uh, potion oils?”

“Sure they do,” Zaar says. He says it with such sureness, like he’s talking about two plus two equaling four. Ryan’s not exactly the skeptic of this group, but even he’s impressed with the unfailing faith everyone around here has in the power of voodoo. “You use them to anoint candles, or amulets, or pretty much any possession that means something to you.”

“Huh,” Ryan says, pretending he understands what _anoint_ means. He puts the vial back.

They’re sort of neat, like something out of an old world since swept by under the tide of change. All of New Orleans feels like that, really. The ancient cemeteries, the daunting crypts, the towering trees. All of it rustles and whispers with what almost feels like a preserved life force.

 _Safe Travel_ , says one of the vials. _Do Well In School_ , says another. _Success & Prosperity._ Ryan’s eyes almost skip over one of the last few on the shelf before they go hurrying back.

_Yummy Boy (men attracting men)_

Ryan gulps, and can only hope the sound isn’t audible. Maybe he shouldn’t be surprised. The world of voodoo, from what Ryan can tell, isn’t interested in excluding anybody. He picks up the vial. Innocent bits of roots and plants swirl within. Next to him Zaar is shifting, watching, but not asking.

Ryan will just have to ask, then. “ _Yummy Boy_ ,” he reads aloud. He laughs on instinct, feeling as if he has to for the sake of nonchalance, but the sound comes out flat and unconvincing. “Does this one work too?”

Zaar’s smile is knowing. “It does. For one night, if nothing else,” he says. “I’ve tried it myself.”

Ryan looks over his shoulder just to check. Shane is still a safe distance away at the other end of the shop, exchanging batteries in one the cameras as he browses.

What could it hurt, one little bottle? If anyone asks, Ryan can say it was just for a laugh. It’s very much not a laugh, but the excuse should still work. 

A yummy boy. Ryan can think of worse things to summon. He hasn’t done all that much with guys since realizing he’s a little more open-armed in that area than expected, and a bit of help might be appreciated. What no one told him is that quietly identifying as bisexual doesn’t automatically make trying it out simple and easy and fun. On the contrary, it’s a little bit terrifying, a plunge into a lake of which he doesn’t know the depth, temperature, or mortality rate. A stroll into a dark haunted house with god knows how many unscheduled scares are awaiting him, and everyone knows that Ryan isn’t great with haunted houses.

Maybe this is the solution. He rolls the vial around in his palm, nervously considering. Maybe one night with a guy would help clear things up. Maybe one night would help him stop thinking of—

“Okay, got all the shots we need,” Shane says, suddenly right next to Ryan, who nearly jumps out of his skin. “Boy. This isn’t the scary bit, Ryan. You know that, right?”

Ryan glares. “Yes, I know that, and I’m not _scared_ , you just—you just surprised me,” he says.

Shane’s gaze passes briefly over the wall of potions. It doesn’t seem to intrigue him as much as it did Ryan. “Buying anything cool?”

“Yeah. No. I don’t know, maybe.”

“All right,” Shane says, unbothered. “Whenever you’re ready, then.”

He turns away to go check out another corner of the store with TJ. It looks like he didn’t notice what Ryan was doing or looking at or _holding_ , so there’s a win for Team Bergara. Some stuff he just doesn’t want to explain if he can help it, especially stuff that might consequently make things a little awkward between him and a coworker. Not that Ryan’s inappropriate feelings haven’t already accomplished that, but as far as Ryan can tell, he’s been keeping those nuggets of information well hidden.

Even so. He’s buying the damn bottle.

\--

It’s not that Ryan is _happy_ about his crush on Shane.

More than anything, it’s just something he’s come to accept as an unchangeable and mostly unpleasant facet of the human experience. Like taxes. Although Ryan would much rather file his taxes than wrestle with sticky, inconvenient, unwanted feelings about his coworker, especially since the coworker in question often shares beds with him in the name of ghost-hunting and sits next to him all the live long workday and is generally a bit of an ass to Ryan just for giggles. 

Making that last one a little less significant is that Ryan is often in on the giggling too, because Shane is unfortunately funny.

It started like that, because Shane wouldn’t _stop_ being funny. Ryan was perfectly happy with how things were going, enjoying how Unsolved had brought them together after the Test Friends, how their organic chemistry and easy banter was translating well on camera, how fun it was to travel the country looking at crime scenes and spooky houses. Until all of a sudden Ryan realized he was enjoying all of it a bit too much.

Still, he has it under control. It’s not like he’s _in love_ with Shane.

Ryan’s brain goes fuzzy for a moment thinking about what being in love with Shane would entail. A second later, he firmly decides not to think about it anymore, or ever again.

At the very least, not while they’re filming. They still have the cemetery segment to take care of before they stop by Bloody Mary’s, and the last thing Ryan needs is to wear his heart on his sleeve right in front of a lens. The first rule of having a crush on Shane is _not talking about having a crush on Shane_. The second rule is verbatim. But the third is not ever making it obvious that he has said crush. 

He almost expects Bloody Mary to read it all off of him when they first meet her and she welcomes them into her unorthodox home. Everyone’s a little psychic, she says, looking at Ryan in a way that feels like what she’s actually saying is _I’ve seen inside your skull and know all of your most sensitive secrets_. If the disembodied-head-in-an-oven story isn’t enough to creep him out, Bloody Mary’s all-knowing, all-seeing eyes definitely are.

“It sounds like we do have to meet in the middle, which we did not tonight,” Shane says later in the car. Unflapped and unflavored by anything they saw together. “But maybe in the future!”

Ryan’s still a little jittery. “No.”

“I don’t know, Ryan, I think we’ll get there.”

Ryan thinks about what _meeting in the middle_ would entail for Shane. Ryan would love to meet in the middle, but he’s pretty sure his idea of what the middle is widely differs from Shane’s idea. Ryan’s middle is less about them agreeing about ghosts and aliens and more about Shane giving making out with Ryan a try.

His hands flex on the steering wheel. “I doubt it.”

“You gotta learn to not be so scared, though,” Shane says. He says it casually, little more than an off-handed razzing, but it still makes Ryan think. Is he being too scared? Is he treating Shane and his ridiculous crush like just another haunted basement, too daunting to even attempt to brave? Too frightening to confront? 

Or maybe some things really are better left alone. Ryan swallows and looks at the road.

\--

Turns out that _anointing_ is really just dabbing oil on to things while concentrating on good, wholesome vibes. Ryan Googles as much during the walk back to the hotel that night after meeting with Bloody Mary. 

Sounds easy enough. By the time they’re in the hotel room and Ryan’s in the bathroom, he slips the vial out of his pocket and gives it another long, hard look. It seems so unassuming. Ryan can’t fathom how it’s supposed to function as a flute-to-snake song for him in the eyes of other men, but by now he’s too intrigued to back out.

He pops the stopper off and gives it a sniff. It’s fairly musky, and sweet as well. A bit like an outdated but very strong perfume.

He doesn’t have any special pieces of jewelry or mementos on his person. Could he hypothetically just smear it on himself? Dab a little behind the ears, like cologne? He should’ve asked Zaar more questions in the shop; now he’s just an idiot with a potion and no idea if he’s using it right. Oh god, what if he uses it _wrong_? If the potion fails spectacularly, does the opposite come into play, and he’ll be cursed to repel yummy men forever?

He tips some onto his fingers and rubs it on his wrists and behind his ears before he can overthink it. It’s a greasy feeling, smooth but definitely oily.

Ryan looks at himself in the bathroom mirror. Is he supposed to look different now? _Feel_ different? Ryan wasn’t expecting to turn into the glistening man on the cover of a bad romance novel, but he was expecting some degree of a reaction. He shifts from foot to foot, examining carefully. 

“Hey,” Shane yells through the door. “You almost done in there?”

“Just a second!” Ryan says, stuffing the bottle into his pocket.

When he steps out of the bathroom, Shane’s flipping through fuzzy TV channels, sitting on the edge of his bed. He glances at Ryan. He doesn’t swoon at the sight, so that crosses immediate, nuclear reactions off the list of possible aftermaths.

He does sniff the air a little bit, though. The oil is definitely strong, but evidently—thankfully—not strong enough for Shane to comment on it.

“You want to go out?” he asks instead. “Get a beer? One last rowdy night in the Big Easy?”

Ryan thinks of their last rowdy night in New Orleans. Specifically, how tipsy they both were, hanging over a balcony on Bourbon Street throwing beads, Ryan laughing at everything Shane did because it really _was_ that funny, okay—

All right. As long as they’re not _that_ rowdy again, it should be fine. And besides, maybe he can take that potion for a test drive.

“Yeah, why not,” Ryan says, rolling his shoulders. “Got a place in mind?”

\--

Ryan is halfway through his bottle of beer when he starts to realize that people in this bar are watching him. Possibly more than what would be considered normal.

The bartender winks at him when he brings Ryan his drink. The guy at the end of the bar smiles when Ryan walks by him to go to the bathroom. The gaggle of men playing pool gives him a once-over that seems awfully appraising. Ryan can’t tell if he’s just hyper-aware of every look in his direction or if this is all totally normal. 

“You okay, man?”

Ryan snaps his attention back to the bar, where Shane’s looking at him, gently amused.

“Yeah. Sorry,” Ryan says.

“You just look a little jumpy,” Shane says. “Lots of checking over your shoulder for little ghosties.”

“Little—I’m not looking for _ghosts_ ,” Ryan says. “I’m looking at—” He clears his throat. Maybe the ghost thing is less embarrassing than the truth. “Fine, I’m looking for ghosts.”

Shane hides his smile around the rim of his glass. “Still rattled, huh?”

Ryan rubs subconsciously over the spot behind his ear where he put on the oil. _Anointed_ himself. “Yeah, kind of. This voodoo stuff is just a bit freaky. You should’ve seen some of the stuff I read on Marie LaVeau.”

Shane shrugs, casually interested. “Tell me.”

“Did you know that she had, like, fifteen kids?” Ryan says. “But with her second husband. Her first husband just totally vanished.”

“Fed him to the gators?”

Ryan slowly lifts his eyebrows. “Or maybe something a bit more paranormal came into play.”

“I don’t know, Ryan. Voodoo rituals seem like an awful lotta work if a helpful gator is just, you know. Right there.”

Ryan laughs. There Shane goes, being funny again. It’s starting to feel like someone’s taken a cheese grater to Ryan’s heart. It used to be more fun, this mammoth crush. Nowadays it’s starting to feel like something Ryan actually has to _deal with_ , which: ugh.

Although maybe _dealing with it_ could entail a yummy man who looks nothing like Shane summoned through the powers of voodoo potion oils.

He glances around the bar again, searching for options. Targets. _People_ who might be interested.

“Look, Ryan!” Shane says, dragging Ryan away from his foolproof plan. “They have a dartboard. You wanna play?” He clears his throat, fixes his collar. “Maybe I should rephrase that. You wanna get _annihilated_?”

Ryan likes a challenge too much to not rise to the bait. “Bring it on, you Sasquatch,” he says, getting to his feet.

They play a few games. Shane proves himself to be, annoyingly, not that bad at darts. It’s a little irritating that even after all this time, Shane can still surprise him, while Ryan feels like he’s been thoroughly figured out, an open book that’s easy to read just by skimming. Shane lands a few decent hits at first that Ryan dismisses as beginner’s luck, if only because it looks so easy, but by the time Ryan gets a turn, he realizes it isn’t.

“Must be your weirdly long limbs, man,” Ryan says, shaking his head while he tugs his darts out of the wall. The only consolation for him is that other people, at some point in time, have sucked at this as much as him, considering his holes aren’t the only ones dotting the wall. “They’re giving you an unfair advantage.”

“Seems like someone’s been drinking their sore loser juice,” Shane says. Almost sing-songs. Amazing how there’s someone out there who Ryan alternates between wanting to put in a headlock and wanting to kiss up against the nearest flat surface. “If you want tips from the master, I’m right here.”

“Shut up, Shane.”

They play for a good while, at least until Ryan starts to show incremental signs of improvement, which Shane does his best to hinder at every turn by pretending to sneeze whenever Ryan’s about to throw his dart.

“I’ll get us a refill,” Shane offers while Ryan refocuses and reshuffles his feet back into place behind the oche line. “You make sure to win the championship while I’m gone.”

Ryan flips the bird to his retreating backside and goes back to practicing. He’s in the middle of cursing after his dart ends up in a particularly lopsided landing when he notices that someone’s approached him, a man standing a few feet away, quietly observing. He’s smiling, as if entertained by Ryan’s lack of talent, which Ryan only tolerates from a few choice people in his life. One of whom just got _done_ laughing at Ryan.

“Maybe I should charge admission if my failure is so funny,” Ryan says.

The guy’s smile breaks, making room for laughter. “Sorry,” he says. “I can help, if you’d like.”

Now that he’s laughing, Ryan realizes that he’s not bad looking. _Yummy man?_ his brain helpfully supplies, and that’s actually a little awful, that it’s only been a few hours since he’s had this potion and he’s already sorting strangers away into categories of _Yummy Men_ and _Not Yummy Men_.

There’s just something safe and comfortable in having a no-strings-attached one-night-stand in a city so far from home. All those people partying on the streets, walking through the shops, drinking in this bar, are people Ryan will never see again.

Unlike Shane, who Ryan will see again. Who Ryan is seeing decidedly too much of. Who Ryan and his feelings need a break from, if only to remember what it’s like to think about someone else.

“Yeah?” Ryan asks. “Whaddya got?”

The guy takes a step closer. His hand hovers over Ryan’s where it’s holding his next dart. “Can I?”

At Ryan’s nod, he grabs Ryan’s hand with both of his, coaxing his fingers into different shapes. It feels somehow both intimate and as if he’s back in PE being lectured by his coach, like Ryan’s possibly being flirted with or, also possibly, just being tutored. Maybe—horrifyingly—that’s Ryan’s type, people who find the elusive sweet spot between belittling him and charming him and teeter endlessly between the two.

“It helps to unclench your fingers,” the guy tells him. “You just have to relax a bit.”

“That’s not his forte,” Shane says, suddenly back from the bar. Somehow Ryan didn’t notice his monolithic shadow creeping up on them. “Relaxing, that is.”

He has a funny look on his face. He seems a little unsure of what to do next, hands full of fresh beer, eyes traveling slowly from Ryan to his new friend, lingering on the latter. It’s weird. The vibes have gotten distinctly weird.

The weirdness on Shane’s face is gone a second later, like someone’s flipped a switch and lowered a curtain on Shane’s expression. He puts their glasses on the table. “Sorry to interrupt the masterclass,” Shane says. “I apparently can’t leave you alone for even two minutes or you’ll start recruiting mentors. Unfair tactics, Bergara.”

“Well, I wouldn’t have to if you weren’t so annoyingly good at darts,” Ryan says in defense.

Stroking Shane’s ego earns him the smile Ryan was going for, but it’s tight around the edges. There goes his mood again, Ryan thinks. He can practically hear Shane creating distance between them, as he always does lately when his disposition goes subtly sour, like he needs space to make sure Ryan can’t figure out what’s wrong with him.

Still, Ryan would like to know. Certainly more than he’d like to stand around yapping with his self-proclaimed darts teacher. Even if it’s dumb, even if it’s masochistic, Ryan doesn’t want space from Shane.

“Come on,” he says, reaching for his beer. “Another game, yeah?”

“Eh. Maybe a short one,” Shane says, even though he was totally into kicking Ryan’s ass five minutes ago. “Kinda just thought we would finish these up and head back to the hotel.”

“Aw, man,” Ryan needles. “You really want to go back already? It’s still early.”

Shane taps his wristwatch. “Duty’s gonna call early in the morning, Ryan.”

“Yeah, but. We’re in _New Orleans_. I didn’t hear you complaining about staying out past curfew when we were on Bourbon Street the other night.” Tomorrow’s already their last day, and they’re going to be spending most of it walking through neighborhoods while Ryan talks about the Axeman. “Come on. There’s still so much stuff we have to do.”

That, at least, piques Shane’s interest. He wipes his mustache of beer foam off his upper lip. “Like what?”

\--

Ten minutes later, they’re walking through the French Quarter while Ryan hypes up their destination.

“I should’ve known it was a murder house,” Shane says, shaking his head. “ _Of course_ it’s a murder house. I’m a chump for not realizing.”

“What did you expect at this time of night anyway? A library?”

Shane’s still shaking his head, but the effect is dampened somewhat by the smile he can’t hold back. It’s a bit of a muggy night, the air heavy with wet warmth, too heavy for jackets. Shane’s carrying his slung over his shoulder, gamely going along with the adventure Ryan’s convinced him to participate in. He always goes along, even if he does rib Ryan the whole time.

Ryan leads them away from the busier streets, taking a left onto a quieter road, mostly just businesses that have shuttered for the day and inner city apartment buildings.

“Anyway,” Ryan says, focusing. “You’re gonna love this one. They call it the Sultan’s House ‘cause in the 1930s, it was rented out to a guy who called himself _The Sultan_.”

“Let me guess. He died there. Horrifically?”

Ryan grins. “Horrifically,” he says. “ _And_ mysteriously.”

“An unsolved mystery, as I live and breathe,” Shane says, clutching at his heart. “Why didn’t this make it as an episode?”

Ryan shrugs. “I don’t know. Next time, maybe. Consider tonight a preview.”

They round a corner onto Dauphine Street. On the corner, unassuming in the moonlight, sits the house in question. Dark iron lattice work adorns the railing of the second floor. The window shutters, deep green, are a stark contrast to the peachy pink walls.

“Nice… watermelon colors,” Shane observes, thoughtful. “Colors of danger, obviously. You can really feel the sheer evil of the haunting from that pastel wall.”

Ryan ignores the jokes, only partly disappointed that there isn’t a camera around anywhere to catch them. “It’s a private residence now,” he explains. “Apartments or something.”

They approach the house. It looks very normal from their vantage point, like plenty of other buildings in the city. Ryan’s always good with the exterior of haunted properties. Sidewalks and yards always feel like a comfortably safe distance from which to ghost-hunt from.

“Apparently he had tons of harems and servants,” Ryan says.

Shane’s head whips over to him. “Wait, what?”

“The Sultan! Let’s just say he liked having company.”

“That’s one way to excuse a harem.”

“Then one day people apparently saw blood leaking out from under the apartment door, and when the police checked it out, everyone had been brutally murdered.”

“Blergh.”

“Like, they had to count the dismembered heads just to know how many people were killed.”

“Double blergh.”

“And here’s the best past,” Ryan says. He leans in, ready to lay down the ace. “The Sultan had been _buried alive_ in the backyard.”

“Oh, wow. That part really clinches the ghost story around the campfire vibe, Ryan. Maybe you should deliver that with a bit more gusto.”

Ryan’s nothing if not a good sport. He spreads his arms wide. “And the Sultan,” he says, dramatically low and slow, “had been found… in his own backyard… buried alive!”

“Woo!” Shane claps. “Give this man his Oscar!”

They approach the dark green door together. Next to it are doorbells and intercoms for all of the apartment units, and Shane briefly traces the edge of a button.

“How _do_ all these people handle living here amid, what I’m sure, are barbaric, mind-boggling hauntings?”

Ryan doesn’t mind piggybacking off of Shane’s mockery to launch into the story. “People say they sometimes hear the screams of the victims,” he says. “And some people say they’ve seen weird figures in their apartments.” He hesitates on whether or not he should add this last bit, but. He digs his knuckle into his ear, shifting. “Which is kinda cool, because there’s technically no proof that any of this actually happened.”

Shane’s breath comes out in a disbelieving huff. “ _What?_ ” he howls. “So what you’re saying is that we’re wasting our time here?”

“No! There’s just—you said yourself it was a really good ghost story if nothing else.”

“Yeah, it is, but you were selling it as fact!” Shane grouses. He crosses his arms. “I shoulda known better. Facts and fiction are basically interchangeable for you, after all.”

Ryan laughs without intending to. It could always be like this, he thinks, almost wistfully. It could be so easy to just add one more thing to what is already a successful friendship and business relationship. They could laugh together, just like they do now, just with much less underwear.

No, _no_. That’s the nauseatingly idealistic, happily-ever-after part of his brain switching on, and Ryan knows better than to give it attention. There are also _so many_ ways it could go wrong, and that’s not even considering the dumpster fire that would be Shane’s hundred-yard-stare and stuttered reasons as to why _this is a bad idea_ and he _just doesn’t feel the same way, Ryan_ should Ryan misread a few signals and confess everything. 

“Woulda made a good episode, though,” Shane murmurs, appreciative, as they walk around the house. When they’ve examined every angle and Ryan’s squinted at windows for unearthly shadows, Shane claps his hands together. “So! Where to next, Ryan?”

“Huh?”

Shane gestures to the house and the street and the general surroundings. “On the ghost tour. The honorary mentions of New Orleans that won’t make it into an episode. C’mon, I know you got more up your sleeve.”

Ryan opens his mouth, then closes it. “Fuck, man, I’m not prepared for that.” He racks his brain over what other options he discussed with the research team. “I have some other ideas, but I don’t think we can walk.”

He expects Shane to bail, to pull out the same responsible excuse he used earlier about them needing to go to bed early, but Shane only smiles. “Lead the way,” he says.

\--

The taxi drive doesn’t take long, only about ten minutes. They zoom away from the inner city while the driver, fiddling with the radio, provides a background soundtrack of eighties love songs.

 _I want the truth to be said!_ croons Spandau Ballet. Next to Ryan, Shane’s humming along, thumb tapping out a matching rhythm on his knee.

The driver ends up dropping them off on Zachary Taylor Drive, where they’re deposited on a dark curb.

“Uh, not to rain on your parade,” Shane says, then rethinks his idiom. “Or, rather, debunk your ghoul expedition. But I think the park’s closed.”

Ryan approaches the gate and squints out into the park. With the streetlamps on, Ryan can see a few walkways and his original goal, but there definitely are a lot of trees in the way. Ryan heads a little bit to the left until he catches a better glimpse.

“There!” he says, pointing. He beckons Shane next to him. “Do you kinda see that fountain over there?”

Shane joins him by the gate, resting his palms on the posts. “Yeah. The thing with the tall pillars around it?”

“Yeah. That’s where I wanted to bring you. That fountain’s got quite a reputation.”

Shane peers through the shadows with concentration. From their angle, Ryan can make out long white pillars on a platform on which the fountain sits, the water off, mostly shrouded by shrubbery. Shane might have a better look, what with his giraffe-like height.

“It’s called Popp’s Fountain. There’s a whole legend about a girl drowning herself here because her boyfriend didn’t want to marry her.” Or something like that. Ryan tries to remember the details. “People say they’ve seen her ghost floating around in the park.”

“Chilling,” Shane says.

“And some people say that just being near the fountain makes you feel funny. Like you lose all sense of time. Five minutes pass but you think it was five hours.”

Shane checks his wristwatch. “Well, that’s a neat little trick, but it’s definitely not happening from our distance.”

“Oh!” Ryan delivers the coup de grâce. “And people sometimes hear crying and moaning.”

Shane makes a noise of skepticism. “How can anyone be sure those aren’t just real people?”

“Because who the hell cries in a park, Shane?”

“Oh, but it’s normal when a ghost does it? You think people die and just lose all sense of how to behave with decorum in a public space?”

Ryan throws his hands up. Sometimes it’s easier not to feed into Shane’s quote-logic-unquote. “Yeah. Yeah, maybe you do.”

“I’m getting the feeling you’re only agreeing with me so I’ll stop talking,” Shane says.

“What gives you that idea?”

They walk a little bit further left, staying flush with the fence. Ryan’s a little disappointed that they don’t get to explore the park properly, with flashlights and cameras and his heart in his throat, but something about the intimate privacy of doing this with Shane—no one recording, just because—is nice too. He almost feels like a teenager again, sneaking around spooky places late at night with his friends.

Ryan glances over at Shane’s profile, dim in the night. Except Shane hasn’t just been Ryan’s friend for a long time, at least not from Ryan’s perspective. Sometimes it feels like his feelings are an inconvenience, a danger, a live grenade he’s holding that he really ought to get rid of, but then there are times like these where they walk through the darkness together and Ryan just wants to reach out and grab Shane’s stupid hand and see what happens.

A slightly clearer view of the fountain comes into sight as they walk along the fence. They stop to admire it. Slash, inspect it for apparitions, in Ryan’s case.

“Apparently witches played a role here too, at some point,” Ryan adds. “So. Lots of fodder for paranormal sightings.”

“Sure, sure,” Shane says, nodding. “I don’t know, though, Ryan. I’m not getting any spooky vibes. Looks nice to me. Sort of romantic.”

Ryan glances at him in his periphery. He swallows, then wonders how audible that was, and quickly covers it up by clearing his throat. “Romantic?” he repeats.

“Well, yeah.” Shane gestures to the area. “The trees are nice. I bet the fountain looks magical when the water’s on. She’s a real beaut!”

“She? Since when are fountains are female?”

“Not sure. But I’ve decided this one is,” Shane says.

“You say some weird shit sometimes, you know that?” Ryan says. _Like when you said it was romantic just now_ , Ryan thinks, and then wants to rip his entire scalp off. How is he supposed to take stuff like that? The Ryan from a few years ago, wet behind the ears and just happy to be in Buzzfeed videos with someone, wouldn’t have thought twice about it, but the Ryan of the present might as well be a schoolgirl with a group chat that dissects Shane’s word choice with his closest friends. He tries to wade this conversation back into normal territory. “Well, I think they do weddings here, so you’re not that far off.”

“Weddings, huh? I’m sure the woman who drowned herself because her relationship failed is real happy about that.”

Ryan has to grin, because okay, that is sort of funny. “If I see her, I’ll be sure to ask.”

They meander along the fence. The park’s pretty big, and Ryan has a feeling that if they follow this gate all the way around, they’d be wandering all night long, just talking and giggling in the moonlight. It sounds appealing, in that way Ryan is sometimes a bit of a masochist. Like when he purposefully chases that feeling of being scared even though he knows it’ll end up with his heart beating him to death.

“How late do you think it is by now?” Shane asks after they’ve walked by the fountain and what looks to be a few silent tennis courts.

“No idea,” Ryan says. “After midnight, for sure.”

“You’re so gonna regret this tomorrow morning.”

“Yeah,” Ryan says softly. Will he, though? “We should probably get a cab back into the city.”

\--

So they do. They have to wait for a while until one drives by the street, and by the time they clamber in, the lull of the car bumping along the road combined with just how long this day has been is catching up with Ryan. He gets a little sleepy in the backseat, Shane’s shoulder warm where it’s pressed against his.

The car drops them off on Bourbon Street, quiet by now, and the walk back to the hotel manages to wake Ryan up again. He can only hear the faint noises of happy laughter and a jazzy saxophone down the street, the raucous parties disbanded for the night.

Ryan can still catch whiffs of the potion oil. Its scent has changed a little since he’s dabbed it on, becoming something sweeter-smelling than it was this afternoon. He’s regretting not asking more questions back at Voodoo Authentica. What sort of results he should be expecting. How long the effects will last. How all this might come back to haunt him should he somehow do it _completely wrong_.

“So,” Shane says slowly. His steps on the pavement are slow, deliberate. “That guy back at the bar…”

He trails off. Ryan glances at him to see if more of that sentence is coming, but Shane seems to be having trouble figuring out what words to choose to finish his train of thought.

Ryan tries to nudge it out of him. “Yeah?”

“Were you…” He trails off again, restarting. “Was he hitting on you, you think?”

Shane’s scratching his ear, possibly to hide his face. When Ryan does catch a glimpse, he sees a few conflicting emotions present, the most prominent being curiosity and, simultaneously, discomfort. The latter knots Ryan’s stomach, and not into an easy knot, either. A complicated one that sailors use to tie their boats to posts.

“Uh, maybe?” Ryan says. That’s probably the safest answer. “I don’t know. We were just talking.”

“And, well.” Shane clears his throat. “I guess I thought the _fixing your stance_ routine everybody picked up in college was a little questionable.”

“Questionable?”

“You know what?” Shane says sharply. “Never mind. I’m tired. I’m super tired. Forget about it.”

He speeds up a little bit. His long legs already have an unfair advantage on Ryan’s, but with Shane’s added hustle, Ryan really has to work to keep up.

And not just on foot. He feels like he’s failed to keep up with their conversation as well, and now Shane’s zoomed ahead. He already had a headstart, the motherfucker, and it’s rude as hell to not even tell Ryan that they went from _the well-trodden path of normal small talk_ to _the unpaved, rocky road of weird questions_. To make matters worse, Ryan can only think of a few reasons to grill him about his interest in men while making _that face_ , none of them good.

The knot that is his pretzeled gut grows tighter.

\--

That night, Shane lies in the bed next to Ryan’s, perfectly still. Like Snow White in the coffin. Even from across the room, Ryan can hear him thinking.

Ryan’s starting to think that Shane’s weird behavior has to do with him. His worst fear comes bubbling to the surface the moment he thinks it: that Shane’s figured out Ryan’s inappropriate crush, and doesn’t know how to handle it. Maybe he’s a little disgusted by the idea of Ryan mooning over him. Maybe he’s been spending this whole time wracking his brain on how to let Ryan down easy.

Not that Ryan will ever let that happen. It would require him to first confess and vomit his feelings everywhere, which he decidedly won’t be doing. It’s the squash-and-ignore approach for Ryan. Like a big bug. You just have to step on it and then pretend its crushed carcass isn’t on the carpet anymore.

Ryan rolls on his side, sighing. Maybe it was a mistake to give up on Darts Guy so fast. Maybe he’s actively working against the powers of the voodoo potion by not indulging all those winks and stares and looks he got all night long and instead taking Shane on an urban myth murder field trip.

It’s not a _problem_. Ryan isn’t going to let it be a problem. If things continue to go well, which Ryan really hopes they do, he has a long working relationship ahead of himself with this guy. He can’t screw it all up by indulging in his ill-advised crush, not even a little bit. Ryan’s on the edge of Feelings Cliff, and it’s a damn slippery slope. It’s why he bought the fucking voodoo bottle, dammit, and he needs to commit to it.

\--

As Shane foretold, they all get up at ass o’clock the next morning for breakfast. Ryan’s still half-asleep shoveling eggs into his mouth at the table, cursing the person he was last night for not listening to Shane and going to bed earlier.

“You look good,” Shane says around a mouthful. “Really alive.”

“Shut up,” Ryan grumbles.

Shane does not, unfortunately, shut up. “Hmm. Remind me, Ryan. Who was it who said we should go back to the hotel early because we had a busy day ahead?”

Devon, who’s clearly listening in and only pretending to be busy on her phone, turns to them, accusatory. “You guys went out last night? How late?”

Shane waves a fork in Ryan’s direction. “Ryan had a whole murder tour planned.”

“I _did not_ —god, Shane, you’re the worst. And it wasn’t a _murder tour_. And you’re the one who wasn’t satisfied with just one house.”

Shane holds his hands up, a gesture which somehow looks both conciliatory and aggressive when he’s the one doing it. “It was a lame house, Ryan. That whole story coulda been bogus.”

“We don’t know that! Nobody knows that!”

Shane hides his smile behind a bite of toast. Ryan would hate him for constantly riling him up if a part of Ryan didn’t sort of enjoy being riled. It’s a surefire way to wake him up, if nothing else.

“It was good,” Shane admits, chewing his toast. “You know, I actually had fun.”

“You don’t have to sound so shocked, idiot.”

“Well, I was. You cobbled together some interesting information on the fly, after all,” Shane says. “We should go off the script more often. Just explore shit that didn’t make the episode.”

“Yeah,” Ryan says. He also had fun, even if hanging out with Shane these days is equal parts good-hearted fun and gut-wrenching pining. “Even though I’d kill you if we saw a ghost and didn’t have a camera around to catch it.”

“Yes,” Shane says, deadpan. “That is totally a thing that could happen.”

“Guys,” Devon says. “Less bickering, more eating. We have stuff to do today and we’re already behind schedule.”

Shane looks at Ryan with flat reproof. “See, Ryan?” he needles. “Are you happy now? We saw your little fountain, got back way too late, and now we’re _behind schedule_.”

“You sound like you’re about to ground me,” Ryan says. He doesn’t hate that, although the second the thought creeps into his brain he refuses to explore it further. Not today, Satan. “Are you gonna take away my video game privileges?”

“Oh, I’ll take something away, all right.”

Ryan thinks about it. “Your… friendship?”

Shane sighs, theatric. “No, Ryan, I won’t take away my friendship.” He reaches across the breakfast table and snatches up Ryan’s unopened yogurt. “Maybe I’ll just take this. How does that feel, huh?”

“I’m devastated.”

“You should be,” Shane says. He examines the container. “It’s got _fruit at the bottom_ , Ryan. You really blew it.”

Ryan points to the buffet. “I can just get another one, you know.”

“And I’ll take that one, too. All your yogurts shall henceforth belong to me.”

Ryan snickers. “If that’s the price I gotta pay,” he says, and finishes up his eggs.

\--

After breakfast they walk from house to house, filming location shots to pepper in the Axeman episode. They’re just houses and empty lots in quiet neighborhoods now, nothing to suggest a gruesome past, but Ryan still thinks these bits will add a nice touch, a change of scenery from the dark desk they usually hunker behind.

Shane looks a bit distractingly good in his plaid shirt and well-fitting pants. Dimly, there’s a part of Ryan that still remembers what it was like to work with Shane before all his unfortunate, yucky feelings got in the way, but that part is slowly but surely being erased forever from history. Now it’s just looking at Shane but trying not to look at Shane and wondering if he’s looking at Shane too much and juggling all of the above like steaming hot potatoes.

Sometimes, though, Ryan wonders if Shane’s staring too, just every now and then. And with it come yet more questions, all of which make Ryan want to be swallowed by the ground in one clean gulp.

Has he always stared at Ryan like that, and Ryan’s just started noticing? Or is this a new development?

They make a coffee stop after they finish up at the last house on the Axeman tour. Shane’s thirsty and Ryan’s lagging and the rest of the team want a shot of caffeine before they all go back to the hotel to pack, so Ryan pops into the nearest cafe on the way and places everybody’s orders.

The barista is sort of handsome. Blond hair, roguish smile. Ryan remembers last night’s darts player and how Ryan gave him the brush off because he was too busy mooning over Shane like an idiot. He shouldn’t make that same mistake twice, especially not if there’s a shelf life on that potion that he doesn’t know about.

“That’s a lot of coffee,” the barista says after Ryan rattles off the last drink order. “All for you?”

“It’s for me and my colleagues,” Ryan explains. “We’re in town for work.”

“Oh, then welcome to New Orleans,” he says with a bright smile. “Are you staying for a while?”

 _He’s going to ask you out,_ Ryan thinks. He can feel it, can _see_ it in that coy grin.

The bell to the coffeeshop tinkles, and in walks Shane, who spots Ryan quickly enough and heads over.

“Hey,” Shane says. “Turns out Devon wants an espresso instead of a coffee.” He turns to the barista and raps his fingers on the counter. “Too late to change that?”

The barista goes about changing it. Ryan’s too preoccupied with his thoughts to even pay attention. He just can’t figure out what’s actually going on here with Shane, if he’s purposefully being a perpetual cockblock just to grate Ryan or if he really is—in accordance with Ryan’s pitiful luck—just always in the wrong place at the wrong time. It’s almost like _every time_ Ryan tries to let this potion do it’s mojo, there’s Shane, popping up, being a _presence_.

“I’m gonna head to the bathroom real quick,” Ryan mutters.

In the stall, he fishes his potion vial out of his pocket and stares at it. _You gotta work with me here_ , he thinks. He gives it a little shake for good measure. Then he opens it back up and reapplies it, generously this time. By the time he’s done, the entire restroom smells of a musky blend of herbs and flowers.

When he reemerges, Shane’s balancing two trays of coffee cups in one hand and is staring at a napkin in the other.

“Hey,” Ryan says. “What’s that?”

Shane stares for another moment. Finally, he snaps out of whatever thought process his oversized noggin is busy with and hands Ryan the napkin.

“Ha. Here,” he says. He laughs, very dryly. “For you. From the friendly barista.”

Shane points vaguely behind the counter. Ryan looks at the napkin, and written on it in black marker is a phone number and a smiley face. Ryan can’t even help it; he giggles. If this entire situation wasn’t so ludicrously embarrassing he’d be rubbing it in Shane’s face right now. _Voodoo works, baby!_

“He gave me his number,” Ryan explains, grinning. He waves the napkin around like it’s too hot to touch. “Guess some people just can’t resist the charms of the Bergmeister.”

“Guess not!” Shane says, a little too loudly. He shifts one of the trays to his free hand. “Come on. These are all getting cold while you’re busy showboating.”

He turns to go, nudging the door open with his elbow. It’s a pretty swift departure, even for someone with such long-ass legs. Ryan stuffs the napkin into his pocket and follows.

Shane’s reaction—distant, cool—falls in line with Ryan’s theory. He stews in it the whole way back to the hotel, pinballing between embarrassment and rage and soul-crushing disappointment. It doesn’t take a genius to connect the dots here: Shane’s off-putting mood flares up every time a guy tries to put the moves on Ryan because it serves as a reminder that Ryan’s into dudes, and maybe also into _him_. He’s figured out Ryan’s secret and is highly disturbed and annoyed over it, which seesaws Ryan right back to _rage_ , because who exactly does Shane Madej think he is? Ryan’s the one dealing with all this shit. Ryan’s the one who deserves to be aggrieved. He has to live a life where he’s attracted to a lanky, big-headed weirdo. Ryan should be getting _condolences_.

Devon tries to make conversation, but Ryan’s not in the mood, and Shane doesn’t seem to be in the mood either. It makes for an incredibly slow and painful trek back to the hotel, interrupted only by instructions regarding when they need to be out of the room by. The hotel’s made an exception for them and given them a later check-out so they could film the Axeman material, but they don’t have time to dawdle.

Ryan lets himself sneak a peek at Shane once they’re back in their room, preparing to go. He has a look on his face that Ryan’s seen before, an expression of almost irritated concentration, like he’s looking for the holes in one of Ryan’s more outrageous paranormal theories. The familiarity of it should have been comforting, but instead it slices through Ryan. Shane’s doing to Ryan what he does to all things he finds outlandish and absurd: try to think it over, find ways to explain it, search for a return to normalcy. Ryan doesn’t want to be explained. Right now, he doesn’t even want to be perceived, let alone thought about.

He throws his clothing into his bag by the handful. Shane’s folding his clothes, the bastard, and for whatever reason, the sight of him neatly doing so makes Ryan grit his teeth.

“Dude,” he finally says. “What’s up with you?”

Shane’s eyebrow twitches, but other than that, he offers Ryan no real reaction. He just keeps folding. “Huh?”

“You’ve been—kinda quiet.” Ryan briefly rolls his lips into his mouth. He’s terrified of the answer, equally terrified that Shane doesn’t trust him enough to answer at all. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” Shane says.

“Nothing?”

“Nothing.”

Shane folds another shirt. Even the way he’s folding is wrong, and it’s like a fingernail is scratching Ryan’s heart. Who folds a shirt like that? You’re supposed to start with the sleeves.

“So you’re not mad at me for no reason?” Ryan pushes.

Shane’s folding momentarily stutters before returning to normal. It makes Ryan notice that his hands have gone white around the fabric. “What exactly are you looking for me to say, Ryan?”

“Uh, the truth, maybe?” Ryan says. “Why have you been acting so weird, man? So—I don’t know, so hot and cold. I’ve picked up on it.”

Ryan really wasn’t going to push, but now it feels like pushing is the only option. Shane’s mood swings have cornered him and now he has to shove his way out.

Shane finally stops packing. He takes a seat at the edge of the bed, suddenly looking very tired. His eyes are everywhere but Ryan: on the wall, the carpet, his own knees.

“I don’t really want to talk about this,” Shane says quietly.

“What even is _this_?”

“I don’t think you want to talk about this either, Ryan.”

His voice is a warning, but Ryan’s never been great at taking warnings. Not from Shane, anyway, who makes Ryan contrarian just from habit, and who right now is pissing Ryan off because he ostensibly feels qualified enough to tell Ryan what it is he wants and doesn’t want to talk about. 

“Just spit it out, man,” Ryan says. “What, is it about me?”

He desperately wants Shane to say no. He needs it, to know that he hasn’t fucked this all up by accident.

“It’s just getting to be a bit much, honestly,” Shane says. He’s still not looking at Ryan. It’s a bit unnerving that he can hang out in demon-infested houses without blinking an eye, but this topic of conversation is actually managing to unsettle Shane, someone who is infamously and frustratingly unsettleable.

Ryan has a bad feeling taking shape in his stomach. “What is?”

Shane scrubs a hand over his face. “All this. The—traveling with you so much. It’s a lot.”

What Ryan hears is that _he’s_ a lot. He’s hit with that sinking feeling of realizing that he’s completely misjudged a situation: that while Ryan’s been skipping along, having a ball exploring the country with his friend, said friend has apparently been counting down the hours until it’s over. 

“Oh,” Ryan says, hollow. “I didn’t—I didn’t realize it was such a chore for you.”

Shane sighs. “I didn’t say that.”

“Well, you kinda did.”

“I just—I don’t think you’d get it, all right?”

Ryan’s sinking feeling is quickly turning frosty. Turns out he thought he was just on a little leaky boat, but actually, he’s on the Titanic about to nosedive into icy waters. He hates it when Shane does this, acts like he’s smarter than Ryan, somehow more logical and therefore superior because he doesn’t put any stock in the paranormal like Ryan does. Like Ryan somehow can’t comprehend an adult conversation.

“So, what?” Ryan’s turbulent emotions are quickly finding ground in defensive anger. “You want to ditch the show? What’s the plan here?” 

Ryan’s anger is, for some reason, also becoming Shane’s anger, who’s shot to his feet. “No! I just need you to give me some— _Jesus_ , give me some goddamn space.”

Oh, Ryan would _love_ to give him space right now. He’d love to leave a Ryan-shaped hole in the wall to always remind Shane of what an asshole he is. He’d love to have his own hotel room where he can go and be angry in peace without having to lock himself into a bathroom to do so.

“Fine. Fine! I had no idea I was annoying you so much, but thanks for telling me!”

“God, Ryan! I told you that you wouldn’t get it and you aren’t!” Shane’s eyes have gone a little wild. It feels like he’s ahead in the conversation again, desperately waiting for Ryan to sync up with him. “I’m in love with you, you idiot, not that you’ve ever given me the common courtesy of noticing!”

Ryan blinks, rendered speechless. He’s _really_ sliding off the Titanic now. His mouth works wordlessly for a few moments.

“You’re… in love with me?” he finally manages to ask.

Shane only stares at him, not confirming or denying. He probably thinks once was humiliating enough. Ryan’s never seen him do anything like this before, so it wouldn’t be a surprise if Shane’s still processing his own outburst.

Oh. Oh _no_.

Ryan’s hand finds the spot behind his ear where the potion’s been sitting, working, creating. Creating this scenario, which Ryan’s been fantasizing about in totally indecent ways, often while on the clock, but never like this. Never because of a _voodoo potion_.

Ryan sinks onto the edge of his bed and digs his palms into his eyes. “Fuck,” he mutters. This is not at all how he envisioned this trip going. This is so much worse than waking up to a ghost looming over his bed. “Jesus Christ. This isn’t how this was ever supposed to happen.”

“Well—no, this isn’t what I wanted to have happen either,” Shane says, all the anger gone and deflated out of him.

Ryan gets back up again. “No, Shane, this isn’t what you think. You don’t feel that way about me. It’s just—just the fucking voodoo potion that’s done this.”

Shane exhales a huff of laughter. “Voodoo potion,” he repeats. “ _What_?”

“It’s not _you_ , okay?”

Shane scoffs, derisive. “Oh, it’s not, is it?”

“I don’t want it to happen—like this. Fuck, it wasn’t even supposed to be _you_ at all.”

The words don’t sound quite as well-assembled coming out of his mouth as they do in Ryan’s head, but even there, they’re more scrambled eggs than anything else. He rubs at his temples, head suddenly pounding. He has no idea how he managed to screw this up so badly. Voodoo should come with some sort of warning label, or a caution sign, or a fail-safe should someone accidentally blow their intentions up in their own face like a character from an old cartoon running from a bomb.

Ryan needs to figure out how to fix this. He can’t leave New Orleans like this, and he certainly can’t go back to the office next week and sit next to Shane like everything’s peachy. He needs to undo the mess he’s exploded all over the walls first.

His legs are a little wobbly, but he can’t let himself sit down again. Shane is standing there, annoyingly long limbs akimbo. He’s visibly pissed off, so much so that it’s radiating off of him in waves and Ryan’s straight in the splash zone. Ryan gets it, he _totally does_ ; Shane’s just doing whatever it is Ryan’s cursed potion is telling him to do.

“I’m gonna fix this, all right?” Ryan actually has no idea if he can, but saying it aloud might help him believe it’s possible. “I’m gonna try.”

“Ryan,” Shane says, exasperated, but Ryan’s already out the door.

\--

It occurs to Ryan later that the thing Shane might have been trying to tell him is that their plane is leaving soon. Definitely too soon for Ryan to reverse the havoc he’s thoughtlessly wreaked on his life and, to make matters worse, Shane’s life.

So he misses the plane, which is something every member of the Unsolved crew warns him about, and then yells at him about via text messages and unanswered calls. It’s fine. Ryan will buy another ticket with his own money if he has to. For now he’ll just have to make up a medical emergency that would warrant him completely ignoring the itinerary his company provided for him.

He obviously can’t tell them about the _real_ emergency. _Sorry, guys. I kinda voodoo’d Shane into thinking he’s in love with me. It’s taking a devastating psychological toll on my general mood. See you in the office on Monday!_

Ideally, he’ll have repaired everything before anybody starts getting suspicious. He just needs to go back to the source of all his problems and seek help there, which is how he finds himself, sweating, as he hoofs it back to Voodoo Authentica.

He all but hurdles through the door and lunges for the nearest employee he sees.

“Is Zaar here? Is he around?” Ryan asks.

The employee points to another room. “He’s doing a tarot card reading right now, but he’ll be done soon,” she says.

Ryan sort of wants to yank his entire head off his neck and scream in impatience. What he says instead, with forced cool, is, “Oh, okay, thanks.”

He fidgets around the shop while he waits. What looked quirky and oddball last time looks almost threatening this time, the statuettes staring him down and the decorative skeleton sitting on a table in the corner giving him the heebie-jeebies. How he ever thought he could handle voodoo when a flickering Maglite sends him running is beyond him.

Finally, Ryan sees Zaar slip back into the shop. He pounces while he can.

“Hey, hi. I’m Ryan, I was here yesterday,” he says in one hurried breath.

Zaar smiles. “Couldn’t get enough?”

“Uh, well, actually.”

Ryan fiddles with the vial in his pocket, retrieving it. Suddenly accusing it feels childish, almost shameful. He’s been looking at the potion like a puppetmaster, cruelly laughing at Ryan’s ludicrous life, but maybe the potion’s been on his side the whole time. Maybe it’s been trying to give him what he wants.

And boy, does Ryan want. But not like that. He can’t start something up with Shane and then spend the rest of his life waiting, in anxiety and anguish, for someone to snap their fingers and the spell to be broken and Shane to wake up from the hypnosis he’s been put under that’s made him want to hold Ryan’s hand and kiss Ryan’s face and tell Ryan he loves him in the middle of a hotel room. He can’t spend forever thinking he tricked and hoodwinked Shane into loving him back.

Ryan shows Zaar the vial. “This, uh. I bought this yesterday.”

Zaar nods. “I remember.”

“I need to know what it can do. How I could, like. Mess it up.”

Zaar raises his eyebrows. Something about him—maybe the ponytail—surrounds him with a mystical sort of wisdom that’s assuring Ryan that he doesn’t need to elaborate further.

“It’ll do it’s own thing,” Zaar says. “There’s really no way for you to do anything wrong.” He stops to think about it. “Other than drink it. Don’t drink it.”

Right, and that’s partially what Ryan’s worried about. That it’ll just _do its own thing_ , like a spinning top whirring and whirring, independent of any assistance once it’s been sent off, and Ryan can do little but watch from the sidelines and start to get dizzy.

“But what can I expect?” Ryan presses. “Is it—is it gonna mindbend people in my life into suddenly finding me irresistible? Could I take someone home with me and then the next day they’d be wondering why the hell they just did that?”

Zaar’s smile twitches. “It’s not some evil concoction,” he says. “It can’t take over people’s minds and force them to feel things they wouldn’t otherwise.”

“Really?”

“It’s just energy with intention,” Zaar explains. “It can’t make energy out of thin air. It works with what’s already there. Charges it.”

Works with what’s already there. Ryan’s starting to get light-headed. If that’s true, and his potion hasn’t shapeshifted Shane into a completely different person who is suddenly, confusingly drawn to Ryan, then Ryan might have messed this all up much more than he originally thought.

Oh, _shit_. The ghost of Missed Opportunities Past, speaking in Shane’s voice, hollers _I’m in love with you, you idiot_ in that same fraught, desperate tone he used in the hotel.

“So what you’re saying is,” Ryan says slowly, because he needs to be really super duper sure, “is that it can’t force anybody to want me. This is a free will only kinda thing.”

Kind of a pivotal part of that potion oil, and Ryan regrets not having already asked.

“Yes,” Zaar says with a slow nod. “That’s what I’m saying.”

“Thanks,” Ryan says. “Thank you. That helps a lot.” Does it? Ryan doesn’t know. What he does know is that the walk back to the hotel will be one he’s doing knee-deep in shit. 

Is that generous? Maybe waist-deep.

“You don’t have to be so scared of it, you know,” Zaar says suddenly.

Ryan blinks at him. He sounds like he’s talking about voodoo, but Ryan has the feeling he’s actually talking about much scarier things. Like Shane, rejected and furious. Or, somehow just as frightening: Shane, actually reciprocating Ryan’s feelings. Ryan actually getting the thing he wants. Ryan actually having to figure that all out.

He thinks of what Bloody Mary said about him and Shane, about coming together, about finding a middle. They had turned it into something of a bit, making jokes and touching palms, but now Ryan’s starting to interpret it in different ways. Maybe it’s also about himself, about meeting in the center of his own extremes. Locating that harmony between heart-rattling fear and happiness.

“Thanks,” Ryan says again. “I’ll work on that.”

He nods and holds his hand out to shake Zaar’s, energized once again with the determination to fix this.

\--

Missing the plane feels like a much stupider decision after Ryan leaves Voodoo Authentica than it did twenty minutes ago. Twenty minutes ago, Ryan thought he was on a quest to find the antidote to Shane’s affliction, the affliction being Having Feelings For Ryan. Now he’s on a quest to remove his own affliction: Being An Idiot About Shane Having Said Feelings.

It sounds so unbelievably dumb now that Ryan’s actually stopping to think about it, so dumb that Ryan can practically hear Shane chastising him and see Shane rolling his eyes. Shane never would’ve let him run in a panic to a voodoo practitioner if Ryan had just _explained_ , even if Shane would’ve been too busy laughing at Ryan to even let him actually finish explaining.

Also, the logistical nightmare of Ryan’s impulse decision goes beyond just missing a flight. It’s well past check-out time, almost evening, and he has no idea where his luggage ended up. He has no idea where he’s going to sleep tonight if he can’t catch another airplane. And, most nauseating of all of the above, he has no idea how to move forward with Shane now, if he should just ignore what happened and merrily move on (the easiest but also the most cowardly), or if he should face it head-on and talk it all out and admit his own stupidity in the entire ordeal.

The decision gets partially made for him once he finishes his walk of shame and makes it back to the hotel to check if his bags are still there, and sitting in the lobby, hunched in an armchair fiddling with his phone and surrounded by both his own and Ryan’s luggage, is Shane.

Like he has some sort of Ryan-seeking radar, he looks up as Ryan walks in. Ryan expects to see anger—which is definitely visible in the pinched press of Shane’s mouth—but he mostly looks tired. Angry and tired is not his best look.

“Hey,” Ryan says weakly, because he doesn’t know what the appropriate opener is after his friend-slash-colleague confessed his love and Ryan then ran off in a panic. “I thought you were on the plane.”

Shane puts his phone away. “No, Ryan, I am not on the plane.”

“Right,” Ryan says. “What did you tell everybody?”

“That you had a complete mental breakdown.”

“Wait, really?”

“No, you idiot, although it would’ve been near the truth,” Shane snaps. “I told them you hurt your ankle.”

“Oh. Good thinking,” Ryan says. He decides to feel out the temperature of the conversation with a tiny mood-lightening joke. “Does this mean I’ll have to walk with a funny limp in the office?”

“I guess you will, Ryan.” Shane folds his arms over his chest. Temperature is colder than anticipated. “Unless you want to tell them the real reason. Say, what the hell is the real reason?”

“Yeah, um.” Here comes that horrible part where Ryan has to explain himself which he really thought he wouldn’t be doing until next week when he’s back in the office. “Sorry about that. I didn’t mean to—I thought you were—”

Ryan sighs. He’s not sure he’s doing any of this right, not that the right thing is even still on the table. The right thing would’ve been to react properly when Shane told Ryan he loved him, to respond in kind and put an end to their stupid fight by kissing the argument right out of Shane’s mouth. That’s a tactic that would probably solve a lot of their disagreements, actually.

Ryan decides to let the vial speak for itself. He digs it out of his pocket and tosses it at Shane.

“Here,” he says.

Shane fumbles to catch it, nonplussed. He rolls it around in his palm before stopping to read the label.

“Yummy Boy,” Shane reads slowly. He looks up at Ryan. “I’m afraid I have more questions than answers, Ryan.”

“I got that at Voodoo Authentica,” Ryan explains. “It’s why all those guys have been flirting with me. Leaving me their number, showing me how to play darts.”

Shane doesn’t say anything for a while. He’s looking at the vial again, lips rolled into his mouth.

“You think that a little bit of voodoo lube—”

“Jesus Christ, Shane, it’s a _potion_.”

“—has brought all the boys to your yard?” Shane says. He frowns at the vial. “Wait, you thought that barista was _yummy_?”

“He was—he was—fuck, I don’t know.” Ryan swallows. “It just made sense, okay? I’d just put on all this potion oil and suddenly all these guys were there. What was I supposed to think?”

“Logically, Ryan. You were supposed to think logically,” Shane says. He sighs; it’s heavy enough to have ruffled some rocks on the moon. “People flirt with you _all the time_. This isn’t some isolated incident.”

“ _What?_ ”

“Yeah. Employees in cafes. People at the airport. Fans. You name it, they’re giving you the googly eyes.”

“What?” Ryan says again. “No way, man.”

“Yeah, they are.”

“Seriously?” A few things click into place for Ryan. “That’s why you’ve been acting so weird. You—you’ve been _jealous_.”

Shane’s looking at him like it’s killing him how slow Ryan is on the uptake. “Yeah. Yeah, I’ve been jealous, ‘cause you attract a lot of attention. Maybe you only just started noticing because of this absurd little—potion, did you say? Let’s go with potion.” He tosses it back to Ryan. “Why exactly did you feel the need to buy that thing, anyway? And in secret, I may add?”

Ryan shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says, which is a lie. He clears his throat. “I guess I was curious,” he adds, which is slightly more honest but still not the bullseye.

He looks at the vial, at the tiny herbs and bubbles floating through the oil as Ryan listlessly tilts it. Then he looks at Shane, whose face has lost the anger. It’s lost the tired slump, too; as a matter of fact, he looks wide awake, intently listening to Ryan’s every word. It’s almost unnerving, but more than that, Ryan feels the pleasant weight of Shane’s attention, the care with which he’s regarding Ryan.

Fuck. If he really is in love with Ryan and was somehow stupidly brave enough to admit it, Ryan really ought to put him out of his misery.

“And I thought it might help me get over you,” Ryan confesses, and there it is. The mighty truth. It sits between them like a pen that somebody dropped, waiting to be picked up.

“Oh,” Shane says. He blinks a few times. “ _Oh_.”

“That all you can say, dude?”

“Well, give me a minute here. An hour ago I thought you were in hysterics because I told you I had feelings for you, so I just need a moment to keep up with the roller coaster.”

“That’s me, baby,” Ryan says. The fact that Shane has stopped frowning is making him feel almost giddy in relief. “A roller coaster. Wanna ride?”

Shane’s laughter is little more than a breathless puff of air. “Who are you? Who is this man in front of me, even?” He looks at Ryan as if he really is seeing him anew, perhaps the same way Ryan is now looking at him: for the first time, as an actual option, and not just a far-off fantasy.

“I love you, man,” Ryan says. “And when you told me you loved me, I thought you were just—just roped into the voodoo spell. It kinda killed me thinking I could have ruined everything like that, so. So I needed a second to breathe.”

“It definitely didn’t look like _breathing_ to me.”

“Okay, fine, panicking. I panicked a bit. Happy?” Ryan sighs. “But not because you said you were in love with me, because I was worried you didn’t mean it.”

Shane gets to his feet, the look on his face so intently earnest that Ryan almost has to look away.

“I did mean it,” he says. “So help me god, because you’re more than just a handful, Bergara.”

“Oh, I can be a mouthful too, if you know what I mean.”

Shane wheezes. He looks not just amused, but also a little shamefully aroused. It’s not something Ryan’s ever been cognizant of before, but he’s definitely seen that look before. A funny little tingle curlicues up Ryan’s spine.

“I’m, uh.” Shane clears his throat. “I’m going to kiss you now, if that’s all right.”

He steps closer in one broad step, close enough to slide his hand over Ryan’s cheek and lean down. Down! Something that used to infuriate and belittle Ryan now feels unthinkingly special, because it’s their dynamic, strikingly different but still balanced, and Ryan seeks to find that same balance here by rolling onto his toes to meet Shane.

And then Shane kisses him, dry and careful. It feels like the start of many, many kisses, which is already making Ryan’s head spin. Ryan puts an arm around Shane’s back and hangs on as if for dear life, and damn, maybe Ryan’s not the only roller coaster personified between the two of them.

Behind them, the elevator dings open and a loud family passes through the lobby, screaming toddler and squeaky suitcase wheels rolling by, and so regrettably, they cut the kiss short. It reminds Ryan of where exactly they are, and just how inappropriate it might be to start consummating their confessions here.

And boy, does he want to. Now that Ryan knows he might be allowed, he feels like a kid in a candy store, fingers twitching and mouth watering with the dire need to touch and taste. Shane isn’t the kind of person—or, to be more specific: kind of beanpole—that screams _irresistible_ , but suddenly, confusingly, that’s what he is to Ryan.

Shane, running a hand through the hair at the nape of his neck, seems to have come to the same conclusion that a hotel lobby isn’t the best place for them to be right now if they have any intention of their feelings getting past the note-passing stage today. He’s looking at Ryan with wide, nearly wondrous eyes, and licks his lips.

 _I was just kissing those lips,_ Ryan thinks, borderline dizzy, as he tracks the movement.

“Man, this timing,” Ryan groans, rubbing a hand over his eyes. “If I had just stopped being an idiot long enough to stay in that hotel room with you we would’ve had all kinds of flat surfaces to use to our advantage.”

“I can’t tell you how happy I am to hear you self-label as an idiot,” Shane says. A flicker of a smile appears. “But, I, uh. I do have some good news.”

“Yeah?”

“I already have the green light to stay here one more night with you in case the, uh, hospital discharges you too late.”

Ryan doesn’t think he’s ever heard anything hotter than the company credit card funding their sexcapades for one saucy night. And Ryan intends to make it count.

“Then I better walk with one _hell_ of a limp when we’re back in the office,” Ryan says. He reaches for Shane, seizing his wrist. “Come on.”

\--

They hustle back to the room with their bags. Suddenly, even lugging their things through a hotel, which Ryan has done with Shane many a time, is fresh and exciting, sparkling with new undercurrents. Now they’re heading back to their room not to set up tripods and hunt for ghosts, but rather to take off each other’s clothes and make out like teenagers. And then some.

At least, that’s what Ryan’s hoping will happen.

“You want to check me for voodoo curses before we do anything?” Shane asks once they’re back in the room. He spreads his arms wide like an invitation.

Ryan bites the insides of his cheeks and still laughs anyway. “I might have to Google how exactly that kind of examination works,” he says. “Glad to see you’re taking this more seriously, though.”

“Glad to see you’re taking this _less_ seriously,” Shane says. He dumps his duffel bag on the chair by the desk. “By the way, you won’t be needing Google. I can walk you through the process.“

“Oh? Didn’t realize you were so knowledgeable about voodoo.”

Shane ignores him. “Well, for starters, it can’t be done wearing any clothes.”

“That’s—wow, okay.”

“And you’d think hands would be dexterous enough to check for curses, but you know what? Turns out tongues do a way better job!”

Ryan crowds up against him, not able to take it anymore—the jokes or the tightness in his pants. He climbs up onto the bed and kneels on the bouncy mattress, giving him a rare height advantage, and grabs Shane by the wrists to tug him closer. Kissing is unthinkably easy at this level, which Ryan immediately starts doing. He winds his arms around Shane’s neck and kisses him with all the vigor that was dormant in their first kiss, reveling in the fact that they’re tucked away in their own room where they can be as loud and filthy and pantsless as they want.

Shane presses himself closer, hands fluttering and flexing against the small of Ryan’s back, and then he makes a funny little noise against Ryan’s mouth that Ryan realizes much too late is a _moan_. 

“Damn, Ryan,” he says. He already sounds a little breathless, which Ryan will gleefully take credit for. “You weren’t kidding about wanting a piece of this.”

“Oh, I’ll want more than just a piece,” Ryan says, concentrating his efforts on ducking into Shane’s neck and kissing the stubbled skin there, because he _can_. Shane’s whole body is open real estate for Ryan now, every last little inch an unexplored frontier. “Although maybe _glass_ is better than _piece_ , since you’re such a tall drink of water.”

“Cheers,” Shane says.

They’re kissing again a moment later. Already, it feels worryingly addictive, knowing how the shape of Shane’s mouth feels against his. Ryan isn’t sure how he’s supposed to go without any of this when they’re at work. It was different when he was just quietly pining from a distance, woefully fantasizing over pressing Shane into a wall and sucking him off, but now that he’s been given the green light on so many ideas, Ryan’s not sure his self-control will be able to withstand the temptations.

Ryan gets his hands around the hem of Shane’s shirt, tugging until it bunches up around Shane’s armpits. Shen laughs—maybe it tickles—and that feels new and exciting too, Shane laughing, but also laughing _in Ryan’s mouth _, and even though Ryan never thought sex between them would be quite so funny, now that it’s happening, it certainly makes sense. They’ve always been equal parts laughter and being scared shitless and bickering and eye-rolling, so it makes sense that all that bleeds into their sex life too.__

___Sex life_ , holy shit. Ryan has a sex life with Shane now. At least, he will the moment Shane takes his damn shirt off._ _

__“Will you get with the program already?” Ryan says, and finally Shane lifts his arms and helps Ryan yank his t-shirt away._ _

__Ryan hastens to get his own off too, and that’s the moment it hits Ryan just what they’re about to do. The thing he’s been wanting to do for an awfully embarrassing amount of time. Maybe it should feel weird, or hyper-pressurized, or unreal, but actually, it only feels _good_. An easy progression of their friendship into something much better. _ _

__Ryan dives back in and kisses down Shane’s jaw and then his neck and then the sharp line of his collarbone, thrilled by the little hitches of breath he can feel in Shane’s chest as he lets his hands wander. Shane’s tall, and a lot of that tallness is in his torso, nice and long and expansive._ _

__“Jesus,” Ryan breathes. “It’s like they stuck your whole body in a black hole. For days.”_ _

__“It’s called spaghettification,” Shane says helpfully. His hands slide down and into the pockets of Ryan’s jeans. “Who’s _they_ , by the way?”_ _

__The hands palming Ryan’s ass are really quite distracting. “Your—uh. Your parents?”_ _

__Shane chuckles, mouth crooked. He squeezes his handfuls, clearly aware of the effect it has on Ryan’s comebacks._ _

__“Oh, Ryan, I had no idea it was this easy to fluster you,” Shane says, overly pleased. “Outside of ghouls and demons and Bigfoot, of course.”_ _

__“Fuck you, Shane, you _know_ I’m not scared of Bigfoot.” Memories of trampling through dark woodlands, absolutely terrified that Shane was going to do his Sasquatch mating call and something was going to come storming out of the trees, shudder through him. Whatever. Ryan can get Shane flustered too. “C’mere.”_ _

__He grabs him by the belt loops and tugs until Shane loses his footing and they’re both tipping over, sprawled over the bed. Shane doesn’t wait long to take advantage of their new horizontal arrangements, crawling on top of Ryan and throwing a leg over Ryan’s hip. His arms, which have always looked deceivingly noodly, are startlingly strong on Ryan’s shoulders._ _

__This is a new angle for Ryan to appreciate Shane from, straddling Ryan to the bed and looming overhead, but Ryan doesn’t have long to soak it in before Shane dips down and fastens his mouth over Ryan’s nipple. Ryan whines._ _

__“Oho,” Shane says, smug. “Lemme make note of all these magic buttons you have.”_ _

__Ryan’s default insults are lost in his throat as Shane descends again, nipping a slow, wet trail down Ryan’s chest. He stops to take a detour at Ryan’s nipples, first biting and then flattening his tongue. Ryan’s pants are starting to feel uncomfortably tight, suppressing parts of himself that he really wants to give some freedom. He lifts his hips, looking for friction, and also looking to drop a few hints._ _

__It’s a hint Shane thankfully picks up on. He slips his hands down to Ryan’s jeans, unbuttoning them. After that there’s a lot of uncoordinated wriggling and shimmying until Ryan’s pants and underwear are kicked off into a corner. It’s something of a comfort that Shane’s fumbling just as much as Ryan is, that he’s just as flushed and affected._ _

__“Come on,” Ryan needles. “I don’t want to be the only one in my birthday suit.”_ _

__“All right, all right,” Shane says. “Patience is a virtue, my friend.”_ _

__“Yeah, well. I don’t think dick sucking is a virtue but I bet you’d rather have that than patience.”_ _

__Shane’s fingers flounder a little on his own pants. It could be that Shane doesn't actually realize just how embarrassingly deep Ryan’s affections go, like he assumes that Ryan’s crush is nothing more than a whimsical curiosity sure to evaporate once he actually gets a taste of man flesh. He has no idea what kind of pornography studio is camped out in Ryan’s mind with Shane as the starring actor._ _

__“Jesus,” Shane says. He laughs in the way Ryan knows he only does when he’s slightly lost for words. “True, I don’t think that’s on the list of virtues.”_ _

__Finally, Shane gets his pants off. Ryan paws at him while he works on his underwear, and the minute his cock is out in the open, Ryan’s hit with an all-consuming need to have it in his mouth. It’s more demanding of an urge than Ryan would’ve expected, but something about Shane, gloriously naked and so goddamn gangly from head to toe, a never-ending map of skin for Ryan’s tongue to explore, is making Ryan’s mouth water. _Yummy boy_ , indeed._ _

__“Shit,” he breathes. “Is it weird how much I really want to suck your dick?”_ _

__Shane’s looking at him with something stuck between stunned awe and amusement. And horniness, too. Ryan also sees horniness. “I mean,” Shane says. “I definitely won’t stop you.”_ _

__Ryan licks his lips, simultaneously excited and so out of his depth that he’s also terrified, mostly of messing this up, but also of _not_ messing this up, and being so unbelievably good at it that he doesn’t even know his own natural power._ _

__He’ll have to figure out positions first, though. He yanks Shane back onto the bed and presses him down into the mattress, figuring out pretty soon that being on top of Shane is somehow just as thrilling as being underneath Shane. He slides down Shane’s body, and he might’ve even succeeded in being sexy about it if he wasn’t visibly shaking. Shane seems to notice, as he always does, and cards his hands through Ryan’s hair, startlingly gentle._ _

__“I just want to be good for you,” Ryan tells him, something about being naked with Shane leaving him helplessly honest._ _

__“ _Ryan_ ,” Shane sighs. “It’ll be good because it’s you, dammit.”_ _

__Ryan grins, and feels some of his nerves leave him. “Because you know I got mad skills, baby?”_ _

__“You know damn well what I meant.”_ _

__Ryan’s grin softens. “Yeah,” he says. “I did.” Even if it does baffle him and confound him that any of this is even happening. That all this time, this wasn’t an unequal equation, an unmirrored reflection; instead, Shane was feeling all the things Ryan was feeling, loving Ryan all the ways Ryan was loving him. Ryan’s not sure it’s fully sunken in yet, and he’s fairly certain it won’t happen for a while. At least a few days. He’s sure he’ll wake up tonight and be surprised to find Shane in the same bed before he remembers it all again and falls back asleep, and the same thing will happen in the morning._ _

__Now, though, with Shane looking at him with those strikingly tender eyes, Ryan doesn’t have any doubts about it. He runs his hands up and down Shane’s thighs, suddenly realizing that Shane’s shaking a little bit too. Ryan quickly kisses a quivering knee before focusing on his goal: Shane’s hard, bare, finger-lickin’-good dick._ _

__Ryan wraps a hand around it, feeling his way, and Shane’s hips jolt up into the touch, movements stuttery. Ryan wants to wind Shane up and uncoil him in slow succession, just like they usually do for the cameras, and he starts by upping the ante and taking just the head of Shane’s cock into his mouth._ _

__Ryan’s touched a dick that wasn’t his own before, has even bumbled his way through enough handjobs to know he’s comfortably bisexual, but he’s never had a dick on his tongue until now. It’s a new sensation, the weight of Shane in his mouth warm and heavy, but more than anything else, Ryan takes note of Shane’s full-body shudder, of his breathy groan, of the plethora of reactions he gets when Ryan plays around with his tongue a bit. He wants to start out slow, stretching his lips and dragging them over Shane’s cock, but before long, ambition kicks in. He doesn’t just want this to be good, he wants this to be _brain-melting_._ _

__He wraps his hand around Shane’s cock as he pulls his mouth away for a moment. “Tell me what kinda stuff you like.”_ _

__“What you’re doing so far seems to be working splendidly,” Shane pants._ _

__Ryan lets the encouragement bolster him. He takes Shane back into his mouth, going deeper, deep enough until tears gather and he has to pull off again, but it seems to be far enough for Shane, who moans, low and guttural. The hand he has in Ryan’s hair tightens, pulling at the roots._ _

__“Fuck,” Shane groans. “Can you do that again?”_ _

__Ryan does, this time with the resolve to hold out a bit longer. He bobs his head a few times, slickening the way, and then takes him in until his throat flutters. Shane’s thighs spasm, trembling. Ryan’s never seen Shane _tremble_ in his life, not even in the face of a creepy island full of decrepit dolls, but Ryan’s managed it. The smugness sits in his belly, pleased, and then goes even further south._ _

__Okay, fine, maybe getting Shane hot and bothered also makes Ryan hot and bothered. It’s a domino effect he isn’t ashamed about._ _

__Ryan drags his dick against the sheets while he focuses his attention on Shane, mostly because if _something_ doesn’t touch his cock soon, even if it’s just a bit of scratchy cotton, Ryan will probably combust in on himself. He builds up a steady rhythm with both his hand and his mouth working in tandem on Shane’s dick, tongue flattening and then circling and then kitten-licking, and it seems to be working, because before long, Shane’s chest starts heaving and his breathing gets ragged._ _

__“Ryan,” Shane says, and whatever it is Ryan has to do to get Shane to moan his name like that, he wants to keep doing it. Make specific notes. “God, you— _yeah_ , Ryan.”_ _

__Ryan all but preens at the broken-off praise. He’s getting shameless in his eagerness, slurping at the precome leaking from Shane’s cock, humming around the thickness of him in his mouth. It may be Ryan’s first ever blowjob, but he already knows it definitely won’t be his last. It’s unlike anything he’s ever done during sex before, and having Shane being the one who’s moaning underneath him only makes it all the hotter. _Shane_ , the guy who isn’t fazed by anything, unflappable in the face of the beyond and everything that lurks within it, who’s now a breathless, groaning mess because of Ryan. The pride at accomplishing that feat alone is making Ryan painfully hard._ _

__“Ryan,” Shane breathes, loosening his grip on Ryan’s hair. “Can I—in—in your—?”_ _

__He can’t seem to speak in anything but fragments anymore, not that Ryan needs complete sentences. Shane’s wildly dilated eyes and pink skin are giving Ryan all the clues he needs. He nods, not pulling off of Shane’s cock. Maybe he should walk before he runs, but as far as he’s concerned, hey. In for a penny, in for a pound._ _

__The go-ahead is apparently all Shane needs. His head tips back against the pillow, body going tense and then limblessly slack as he comes in Ryan’s mouth. It’s a lot, a bit more than Ryan expected, and it’s definitely no vanilla milkshake, but Ryan does his best to swallow what’s coming at him. His momma taught him never to leave a mess behind, not that he really wants to be thinking about his momma’s life lessons right now._ _

__He retreats from Shane’s cock once he’s licked it clean, and when he wipes his mouth and looks up, Shane’s got his arm over his eyes, his breathing labored, boneless against the wrinkled sheets. It ranks up there with one of the hottest things Ryan has ever seen, and his throbbing dick certainly seems to agree._ _

__He crawls up the bed, hoping Shane isn’t too mind-blown by Ryan’s spectacular cock-sucking skills to forget about Ryan, who’s so turned on he’ll start vibrating off the bed and through the ceiling any second. Ryan kisses his elbow a few times, then his shoulder, waiting for Shane’s eyes to reappear._ _

__They do, eventually, along with Shane’s extremely satiated smile._ _

__“Anybody home in there?” Ryan teases, tapping Shane’s temple._ _

__“I’m just surprised,” Shane says. “I thought that mouth was only good for yapping, honestly.”_ _

__“You little—”_ _

__Ryan’s cut off when Shane’s hand curls around Ryan’s cock, soft and slender fingers exactly like Ryan always imagined, if not better. More real, less hazy than what Ryan’s imagination usually provides for him in the shower. The slide of Shane’s palm is easy with how slick Ryan is after rubbing shamelessly against the bed, but even now, the shame refuses to come, probably because Shane’s hand feels too damn good for Ryan to bother. He gives Shane the same show Shane gave him, giving in to the pleasure: he closes his eyes and opens his mouth and lets the noises come out, unabated, hips rolling into Shane’s grip._ _

__“This good?” Shane asks._ _

__“Yeah, it’s good,” Ryan says. Then Shane twists his wrist a certain way and _oh_ , now it’s _great_. “Fuck, Shane, your hands.”_ _

__Shane gently squeezes him on the upstroke. “These ol’ guys?” he says._ _

__“Thought about ‘em before,” Ryan confesses. “How they’d feel on me.”_ _

__They feel so remarkably different from Ryan’s own. The fingers are longer. The palm is broader. The skin is softer. Even just his technique is different than Ryan’s, his grip, his pacing, all of the above acting as a constant reminder of just who exactly is touching Ryan right now._ _

__Shane’s free hand trails around Ryan’s hip to return to his ass, fingers digging in. They stray further, further still, further until they’re descending into the crease and just barely brushing over Ryan’s hole. It’s a feather-light touch, but it still leaves Ryan cursing, brain flooded with new wants and desires and sexual opportunities to discuss as soon as he can think coherently again._ _

__Shane bites down on the curve of Ryan’s neck, almost sharp enough to hurt. “Ryan,” he breathes, his exhale hot on Ryan’s skin. “Jesus, the noises you make. Shoulda known you’d be loud.”_ _

__Ryan hadn’t even realized he was being so vocal, but then a drawn-out whimper slips from his mouth without permission, heady. He just can’t help himself, not with Shane, and especially not when Shane’s doing _that_ with his thumb._ _

__It’s just a little handjob, for Christ’s sake, but still Ryan’s close to unraveling. This is nothing like how Ryan ever imagined sex with Shane to be; there’re so many more colors and sensations than he expected, a kaleidoscope of sexual discovery that Ryan has only scratched the surface of. His muscles go tight as he feels himself tip over, orgasm ripping through him as he comes._ _

__Shane strokes him through it, pulling his hand away only when Ryan starts wriggling with oversensitivity. A knuckle is guiding Ryan’s chin up a moment later, and Ryan turns into it, pliant and willing, as Shane kisses him. It’s tender, almost chaste in the way it was at first in the lobby, and Ryan, in his post-coital bliss, lets himself melt into it._ _

__“Wow,” Ryan breathes when the kiss ends. He stares at the ceiling, body thrumming. “That was—way better than I imagined.”_ _

__Shane’s elbow nudges his side as he readjusts. “You imagined?” he asks, voice surprisingly tender._ _

__Ryan turns to him. It’s possible that Shane, just like Ryan, has spent a while shoving these feelings into a special box, tucked away, under a rug, not to be handled or even looked at, certain of their futility. Ryan wants to convince him to stop thinking like that. He wants to convince him _all night long_._ _

__“Yeah, you dipshit. Of course I imagined.”_ _

__A crooked smile tugs on Shane’s mouth, endearing and almost unbearably dear. If Ryan looks at him any longer, he’s a little worried hearts will replace his eyes, so he grabs Shane by the nape of the neck and reels him back in._ _

__\--_ _

__Afterwards, once the tissues have been dispensed and the flung-about underwear has been found, they brush their teeth together over the sink._ _

__“This is nice,” Ryan says around his toothbrush, pointing between them. It comes out a little garbled with all that foam in the way._ _

__“Whole evening’s been nice,” Shane agrees. “A big improvement on the car crash that was the afternoon.”_ _

__Ryan spits toothpaste out into the sink. “I meant more like, _we’re_ nice.” He gestures to their mirror selves. “Look at us. We just got laid. You can totally see it in our eyes, man.”_ _

__And also in the blooming hickeys emerging on Shane’s neck. And in the ruffled sex hair. And in the dopey smile on Ryan’s face, stuck as if glued there._ _

__They finish up in the bathroom together. They’ve shared hotel rooms and seen each other’s nightly routines before, but something about it feels very domestic now, almost romantic. Which must still be the aftershocks of the orgasm talking, because watching Shane floss is anything but romantic._ _

__When they slide into one of the beds together, ignoring the second, Ryan nudges Shane’s calf with his foot._ _

__“So,” he says._ _

__“So.”_ _

__“I gotta ask. How long?”_ _

__Shane raises his eyebrows. “We can get the measuring tape if you want specifics for your diary.”_ _

__“ _Dude_. You know what I mean.” _ _

__“How long have I wanted you like that? God, I don’t know, Ryan. Wasn't really something that just happened overnight. It happened slowly.”_ _

__“So you’re saying you weren’t instantly struck by Cupid’s arrow?”_ _

__Shane smiles. “Cupid’s arrow?” he says, all faux innocence. “I thought it was a voodoo spell!”_ _

__“Oh my god. Shut up.”_ _

__“No, I think I won’t,” Shane says, gathering steam and gearing up for yet more merciless teasing. “As a matter of fact, you know what just clicked for me?”_ _

__“Do I actually want to know?”_ _

__“You thought that freaky little potion was _summoning_ me to you,” Shane says. “That means you think I’m a _yummy boy_.”_ _

__He looks so inordinately proud about that, like Ryan hasn’t just spent the last hour displaying just how _yummy_ he thinks Shane is. He rolls his eyes, then makes a show of licking his lips. “Duh. That wasn’t clear for you yet?”_ _

__“Oh, that’s right. Yummy, yummy, in your tummy?”_ _

__Ryan bursts out laughing without meaning to, considering that’s one of the stupidest things Shane’s ever said to him. He may never swallow Shane’s come again._ _

__“Jesus Christ, dude,” Ryan wheezes. “Is that what you want me to say after I blow you?”_ _

__“Oh, you don’t have to say it. I know you’ll be thinking it.”_ _

__Ryan grabs him by the wrist and tugs, yanking him into a kiss to shut him up, a technique hitherto denied him that he fully intends to exploit moving forward._ _

__“Your pillow talk needs some work, dude,” Ryan says when he pulls away._ _

__“Don’t get me wrong, I’m touched,” Shane says._ _

__Ryan’s eyebrows do a dance of innuendo. “Yeah, you are,” he says, and lets his hands disappear under the covers. “Especially here, right?”_ _

__“Hah— _Ryan_.” Shane grapples for his bearings and his breath. “You’re _insatiable_. You’re like a—a rodent in mating season.”_ _

__Ryan grins. “Keep up, old man.”_ _

__They banter around a little bit, and that all feels normal too, even here, even now. Things with Shane are easy, so easy that Ryan has to berate himself a little bit for overanalyzing it all so much. The show’s been easy. The chemistry’s been easy. Of course the part where they’re naked around each other was going to be easy too._ _

__And when Shane turns off the light, Ryan wiggles over to Shane’s side and curls himself bossily around him. He pushes a knee between Shane’s legs and presses a kiss to the slope of Shane’s neck, taking his role as the big spoon seriously._ _

__It’s warm, and cozy, and surreal in just how solid all of it is under Ryan’s fingers. Shane shifts, burrowing back against Ryan’s chest. There’s no tension anywhere in his body. He just seems happy to be here, happy to have been here._ _

__Ryan drifts off to sleep easily._ _

__\--_ _

__“Yeah. His foot’s feeling a lot better,” Shane says into the phone while Ryan laces up his shoes. “Right—no. Yeah, I meant his ankle. His foot is just—it’s all involved. He really took a tumble, poor guy.”_ _

__Shane shoots Ryan a sidelong look. As far as lies go, it’s an easy one to maintain, mostly because no one’s here to see Shane’s hickeys. Even if a part of Ryan—possibly the stupid, caveman part—wants people to see them. Specifically, also, wants people to know that it was Ryan who put them there. He settles for reaching out and tugging on the hem of Shane’s shirt, just because. A tiny little intimate touch that still makes Shane’s mouth twitch into a smile at the hand teasing the fabric._ _

__“Yeah, we just got past TSA,” Shane says, readjusting the phone. “We’ll make the flight. Yeah, thanks.”_ _

__Ryan grabs the rest of his things haphazardly thrown together after being inspected by security and gets to his feet, slinging his bag over his shoulder. He grabs Shane’s too, just to be a gentleman._ _

__Shane finishes up the call as they start heading for the duty-free shops, mostly just swapping pleasantries and assurances that he’ll keep Ryan away from any other unfortunate injuries until, at the very least, the plane is on the tarmac. Ryan had woken up to their new itinerary in his email inbox, alongside firm instructions to catch this flight, or else._ _

__He’d also woken up to a few other things, namely Shane’s arm wrapped around his shoulders and his morning wood pressed against Shane’s thigh. That was—different. _Thrillingly_ different. Ryan smiles now just thinking about it._ _

__“Well, I think they officially bought it,” Shane says as he stuffs his phone into his pocket. “We smuggled a free sexcation out of our place of work. Should we be proud?” His brow furrows suddenly. “Hey, did you take my bag?”_ _

__Ryan pats the duffel he has secured around his shoulder. “Yeah, it’s right here.” He grins, going for suave. “You’re totally wooed, right? Figured it was the boyfriendly thing to do.”_ _

__“Leaping straight to _boyfriend_ , huh?” Shane asks. “What if I only wanted you one night for your body? Or, I don’t know, weekends? In case I just can’t help myself.”_ _

__“What, you don’t wanna be my boyfriend, Madej?”_ _

__Ryan lets _boyfriend_ roll around in his brain a little bit, just to see how it feels. Shane seems to do the same: stroking his jaw, thinking, trying his best not to laugh._ _

__“Hm,” Shane says, nodding. “The results are in, and it turns out I _do_ want that.”_ _

__“The results?” Ryan repeats. He snorts. “There a blood test I can take or something?”_ _

__“Ryan, please. Don’t suck all the romance out like—like color from a snow cone!”_ _

__“Oh, I’ll suck as much as I want.”_ _

__Shane grins, mischievous. “Promise?”_ _

__The back-and-forth pauses for a moment so Shane can check their gate number on his ticket while they walk by the perfume shops. Ryan always likes this part, the time before boarding, the transience of the airport. Shane usually sitting beside him somewhere, whether it be a plane or a gate or an overpriced airport restaurant. He likes those traditions _almost_ as much as the very new tradition they started this morning: sharing a shower before breakfast. That was a damn good shower._ _

__Ryan wonders just how many other ways things are going to change now, how the show and work and their lives are going to evolve with the alterations of their relationship. Ryan can’t exactly see them holding hands over the watercooler, but he can maybe see a little bit of footsie under their desks. Maybe a little bit of necking in the sound booth. Maybe a few not-safe-for-work notes passed between meetings._ _

__They find some empty seats at the gate. It doesn’t look like boarding will start for a while, so Ryan drops his bag and rests his feet atop it as he sits down._ _

__He’s dicking around on his phone for only a few minutes when he feels eyes on him. Ryan looks up, curious, and sees, a few chairs away, a guy with a travel pillow slung over his neck staring at him. His gaze skitters away when Ryan makes eye contact._ _

__A curious prickle runs through him. Ryan wonders, despite the endless movie reel in his brain of Shane rolling his eyes, if it’s the potion, still working its slick little magic._ _

__Oh, shit, the _potion_. Ryan urgently pats down his pockets, trying to recall where he put it. He took it out of his jeans this morning before the shower, but he doesn’t remember actually grabbing it again from the edge of the sink._ _

__He nudges Shane. “Dude, I think I forgot my potion at the hotel. I can’t find it.”_ _

__Shane makes a noise of affront. “You still need that?” He frowns. “Is this you trying to make me jealous? Is that what this is, you sneaky little man?”_ _

__“What? No!” Ryan stops searching his pockets, thinking about what Shane’s said. “Wait, you’re right, though. What do I even need it for at this point?”_ _

__Shane plays along. “You gotta keep me on the ropes. The minute I slip out from the potion curse, I’m _outta here_ , baby.”_ _

__Ryan knows he’s joking. But he still reaches out and tangles a few of the fingers together on the armrest, just in case._ _

__“Okay, dude. Let me know if you start to feel it wearing off,” Ryan says._ _

__Shane gives a little laugh, like he’s humoring not only Ryan but the entire idea. “Yeah, okay,” he says._ _

__He winds his fingers more surely between Ryan’s. The warmth between their hands erases all of Ryan’s worries._ _

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on Twitter @ veterization! AREA WOMAN SEEKS BFU PALS


End file.
